SHILLONG, July 7: Director of Health Services (MI) Aman War on Wednesday said the COVID-19 graph in Meghalaya has plateaued and the situation has improved compared to the past two months.
“Our state is different from other states where the graph shot up and came down but ours is a plateau and it is being maintained. It is because we are tracing a lot of high-risk and low-risk cases and we are finding a lot of positive cases and it is good for us since the more positive cases we get the more we can do from our side to enforce containment measures,” he said.
“The situation is much better if we compare with the scenario two months ago, but there cannot be any let-up and we have to go on doing what we have been doing for the past three months so that situation becomes better than what it is now,” he added.
On lowering the positivity rate, Dr War said: “I will have to test a lot of people to lower the positivity rate. A lot of people will test negative and the positivity rate will come down but we will not get the real picture.”
He said it is good that the people asked to undergo testing are coming out positive, thereby helping undertake containment measures.
Dr War said dealing with the challenges associated with the perceived third wave boils down to following the three cardinal rules – masking, physical distancing and sanitisation.
“The coronavirus has mutated very fast this year, unlike last year. Why and how this has happened needs to be studied but the situation is not very good,” he added.
“Opening up does not mean things have improved. If people get vaccinated, there will be a change for the better,” he said.
Ramping up paediatric infra: Dr War
Amid fear and apprehension of an anticipated third wave, the Health department is working on a war footing to ramp up infrastructure to handle paediatric cases by July-end.
DHS (MI) Aman War said on Wednesday that preparations have been going on and the department plugging all gaps to ensure it is fully prepared to handle COVID cases.
On concerns being raised about the insufficient numbers of paediatric ICUs in the state, Dr War said, “We have other ICUs also and we are ramping up PICUs at Ganesh Das Hospital, Step Down Hospital at Umsawli and even in Tura and Jowai. We should have everything ready by the end of this month.”
“We have enlisted paediatricians and medical officers of the state government have been trained. Right now staff nurses and technicians are being trained to handle paediatric cases.”
Talking about the prefab COVID structures, Dr War said, “Prefab is for management of COVID patients, be it children or adults. Preparations are on and additional beds and facilities will be arranged to combat the virus.”
